Neun, the ressurected girl
by Jebe
Summary: What if the whole initial implication in the Anime series that Natsuru was a girl was true? How would it change things to now have the situation turned on its head?
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: Properties referenced include the Kampfer anime and manga.

Author's Note: I've made a point in this chapter to have names broken down with hyphens to show pronunciation. This is not meant to be taken as the characters literally dragging it out, and is mainly to help set precedence when Akane in particular starts doing things like calling Sa-ku-ra, Sak-ur-a in this series.

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"Aaagh!" She took a few second to calm down as she wasn't plummeting to her death. What a horrible dream. She started to go back to sleep when her body rather insistently made the case it would like her to deal with whatever was practically strangling her chest in confining fabric. Mindlessly undoing buttons, she noticed her breasts seemed unnaturally large, before she undid the button that would have fully freed them.

"When did my chest get so big?" She asked rhetorically in wonderment, disturbed on so many levels by such an apparently significant change in her bust size. They didn't simply expand like that and the extra material had to come from somewhere.

Reaching back she checked her hair to find it several inches longer then she remembered it. Checking down below she found she was wearing blue striped panties, despite the fact she couldn't recall having ever owned fancy striped panties like these. They had simply been too expensive. Nor did she remember owning this shirt, which also was above what she could have afforded in the past. Especially to sleep in, all these tailored features, would have insured it just cost too much.

The last thing she remembered was being chased and falling. She had failed to fight back effectively against the other Blue and had written herself off as dead. What with falling off a multistory building into oncoming traffic, in the middle of the night, even if she wasn't killed by the fall the subsequent effect of cars running her over should have spelled the end. Or had that been just a nightmare? Either way she was in a room she didn't recognize, with clothes she couldn't afford, and with bigger measurements then she had ever dreamed of achieving. It was all rather creepy, even if some of it had been the kind of thing she dreamed about.

"You've been selected to be a Kampfer." She didn't like that tone of voice, and it was strangely hypnotic to the point it was the best she could do to resist it. She just managed to isolate it to a weird stuffed animal sitting on a shelf directly above the desk, and quickly grabbed it by the head. Squishing it and the body she couldn't find a voice box for someone to be transmitting a voice from. Nor did the little plush knife, or what she could only assume was supposed to be a piece of intestine have anything that could function as any kind of speaker she was familiar with.

The doll however was making muffled sounds under her hand. Under the circumstances, she was less then inclined to remove it. Not with something that could apparently mess with her head, on top of everything else. Opening a nearby window she dropped the thing outside. All while noting that the apartment building she was in seemed to be absurdly small, and the room rather large for that matter. You'd almost think it was a rather nice two story house, but that would be patently absurd.

Digging through the various drawers she found an utter lack of anything that was in her size. No, it was all this way too small stuff like the shirt she was currently wearing. Not to mention, it was all men's clothing. That had all sorts of negative implications she would rather not think about at the moment. Sighing she sat down on the bed. Her body felt off, given she wasn't wearing a bra and the shirt wasn't so much giving support as containing her enhanced bustline there should have been at least some kind of bounce. Now that she thought about it, her chest didn't seem to be straining against her shirt either. Looking down she noticed a pronounced absence of breasts. She patted her chest a few times to make sure.

"They gone!" Her pride and joy were both missing. After several long moments she noticed her clothes in general were a lot looser too. Maybe it was some kind of weird age reversion effect? She decided not to dwell on it instead of taking advantage of the fact the available clothes now fit her, and thus use it as an opportunity to explore with some shred of dignity intact.

Cracking the door, she found that she was looking at a hallway with a few rooms and a stairwell down. That wasn't like any apartment building she was familiar with. Particularly given the utter lack of appropriate locks on the apartment doors. Wandering around she found there were multiple bare bedrooms, and that downstairs had accommodations appropriate to a house. A rather expensive house the likes of which she only vaguely knew from the rare open house exhibitions her parents had occasionally visited. Although now that she thought about it she couldn't even remember their faces, or any real details about them.

So to review she was in nice and rather expensive empty house, that was in a condition that made it pretty clear nobody actually lived here. In said house only one bedroom had anything more then bare furniture and it was setup as a boy's room, and she was currently wearing expensive boys clothing except for her panties. The owner of these clothes being nowhere to be found. Flipping open the wallet she had found on the desk, she found it contained a not insignificant amount of cash and an ID with a picture that looked just like this weird preadolescent form, for a boy.

No, couldn't be. That was just silly. Who in their right mind would turn her into a boy? Nevermind how or why. She just needed to figure out how shift back to her normal form, and get some appropriate clothes... Going back to the room she noted that it was Monday based on the digital clock. Given she had a student ID among the mix it would probably be best to pretend to be this boy Natsuru so she could at the very least get some answers. Likely not particularly useful answers, but answers nonetheless.

Thank God this house squatting weirdo had written down detailed instructions regarding how he got to school. She would have quickly become rather lost without that as this city or at least the part she was in, was completely unfamiliar and there was something of a lack of readily accessible maps and bus schedules in the house or anywhere she noticed along the way. It also helped that the bookbag was already packed.

The kitchen hadn't been the best stocked, but it had been adequate for her to fix up something that was at least edible. She arrived with plenty of time to catch the bus, only to find a auburn haired girl in school uniform walking towards the bus stop from the opposite direction. She started to make mental comparisons before stopping herself. If she started comparing herself to this girl, while in a freaky prepubescent body that so utterly not in any way really male, or that giantess body she'd drive herself insane in short order. Not that her old body measured up to this well endowed, cheerful girl's either.

"Good Morning, Nat-su-ru-san [aka Natsuru-san]." She yelled in a friendly manner while waving. There were two possibilities as a result. Weirdo Boy was popular and well known, in which case she would be found out because she didn't have the slightest clue how or why. The other option was this was someone Weirdo Boy knew well, in which case the girl would find her out shortly given she didn't even know who the girl was to even begin to pretend to be Weirdo Boy. Why couldn't he just be some dope no one paid attention to?

After some consideration Neun decided there wasn't much point in even trying to be anything but herself. Trying to contort herself into something else wasn't going to help matters. "Good Morning." She yelled back cheerfully, opting to run up to meet the girl.

"You're really energetic this morning, Natsuru-san." She said in a good natured manner while smiling. Leaving Neun with something of a problem as she wasn't sure where to even start. Talking with people she knew was one thing. Talking to people she didn't know was another. Talking to someone she didn't know while appearing to be someone else she didn't really know anything about other then their name was something else entirely.

"Is there something wrong Natsuru-san?" She asked, looking at Neun imploringly.

Neun sighed. Why not? She was probably the best chance she was going to get. "I'm not Natsuru. I'm Nue-n [aka Nuen]." It came out almost as a question as she realized that she couldn't actually remember any particular details of much of anything beyond plummeting to her death.

"Something happened to you didn't it?" She asked in concern, and Neun had the sense she actually believed her.

"I can't seem to remember anything other then Viere hunting me down, and impressions of things. I don't know what's going on with this weird body or who this Natsuru person is, and I'm a girl dammit." Neun felt hot tears start to come out and trickle down my cheeks. It had been a long and crazy day so far.

She felt a comforting hand placed on her cheek. "It's okay, Neun-san. I'm a magician. Bippity-Boppity-Boo."

Neun felt something happen, and saw she was once more the giantess, but in a uniform almost identical to the other girl. While she would have preferred her old body at least she didn't feel like she was in denial. "Thank you, thank you." She enthusiastically hugged the other girl to herself. "I don't know how I could ever thank you enough."

Neun looked down as she felt something odd between her breasts, followed by a series of muffled sounds. Looking down she realized she'd buried the other girl's head between her breasts. She immediately let go.

"I'm sorry. Please don't hate me. I'm not used to towering over people like this, and didn't realize that would happen." She said while bowing towards the girl who had helped her. It seemed like even miracles weren't going her way this morning.

"It's okay." Looking up she saw the other girl's cheeks were flushed, and she was looking at her in a kind of uncomfortable apologetic fashion. She was just horrible, to have embarrassed this girl so much.

"No, please let me make it up to you. I'll..." She was cut off as a gunshot rang out, and a round buried itself in the wall way too close for comfort.

"So you're my enemy?" Came an all to familiar voice. Whirling, her fears were confirmed. Standing across the street was the redhead from her nightmare, or was it a memory, still pointing that pistol at her.

"Vi-ere [aka Viere]." She hissed placing her body between Viere and the girl who had helped her.

"Viere? What's that you big, cow titted, whore?" Neun ignored the insults, more concerned with protecting the other girl then the foul mouthed girl's usual tirades.

"The one you want is me right? Then let this other girl go." Neun yelled back.

"What? Are you some kind of dyke? Why shouldn't I cap her and your big fat ass?" Viere declared, turn her head to the side causing a cascade of red hair to follow.

"Viere." Neun drew out the name, her tone making it a threat.

"Viere. Viere." She barked back mockingly. "What the fuck is a Viere?"

The world seemed to slow down as Viere's finger began to depress the trigger, and she could vaguely make out the hammer coming forward. She channeled her flames, which seemed to come quicker and faster then ever. The two projectiles met in mid air causing Viere to blink, but Neun hadn't just been standing still. Her foot slammed into the other girl's head, as she came down from her jump.

Bouncing off she took advantage of the redhead's disorientation, and rushed her. Grabbing the redhead's wrist and the pistol itself, she managed to quickly twist it out of the other girl's hand, before kicking her into the wall.

"Why were you chasing me? What happened after I fell off that building?" She didn't so much ask as she demanded, screaming at the other girl.

"What are you talking about, you crazy bitch?" The redhead responded derisively.

She'd had enough. Tossing the pistol away, she walked up to the red head and bodily picked her up by the scruff of her, sailor uniform flap style, collar and pushed her into the wall behind her. Her arms shaking from a complex combination of emotions.

"What did they do to me?" Neun saw the redhead's expression change from cocky prideful arrogance, to fear as she started to slam her bodily into the wall. She stopped and dropped the redhead from nerveless fingers as the expression of terror registered. What was she doing?

"Go." She said quietly.

"What?"

"Get out of here you psycho!" Her voice had volume, but lacked heat or real threat. If she was honest with herself there was a sob in there.

The other girl just looked at her for a few moments, and seemed like she was going to say something when she quietly got up. Neun didn't want to hear it or even look at her anymore and turned away. There was a long pause and she felt a hand resting on her shoulder in a comforting fashion. A quick glance was enough to confirm it belonged to the girl who had helped her earlier, not Viere. How she recognized that wasn't something she wanted to dwell on.

"I don't know about anything anymore." Neun wasn't sure she wanted to look at anyone right now. They might as well just go ahead and drag her off to the loony bin, and be done with it. She couldn't remember anything of consequence, her body was all kinds of weird to the point she didn't really even feel secure it was her own, and the world seemed to be conspiring against her. Clearly she had lost her mind.

Almost as from a far off distance Neun felt arms turn her around and being enfolded in a hug. The precipice seemed to retract ever so slowly and she found herself standing in the street with the auburn hair girl clinging on to her aqua eyes looking up in concern. Why did it feel like that? It was almost as if. No, she didn't want to dwell on that. She was here and she was alive.

"Thank you." Neun realized despite all that had happened in however long it had been, she didn't know the other girl's name.

"Sa-ku-ra. Kae-de Sa-ku-ra. [aka Kaede Sakura]" She said gently and helpfully with a light laugh that Neun found comforting.

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The school was huge. According to Kaede-chan it was basically two independent single gender schools that shared a minimum of resources. It was apparently a high ranked girl's school that had come under pressure to be co-ed in recent years, leading to this arrangement where they still had the high ranked girl's school but also a mediocre boy's school. Why whatever was forcing them to do that was satisfied with that solution was something that left her baffled.

Perhaps the most telling thing was there was literally a wall between them, and it was tall enough nobody was scaling it without some serious equipment. Kaede-chan indicated there was also a not exactly minor amount of highly advanced security separating the two sections. All designed to keep the boys in their section. Personally she considered it a waste.

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"Subject 9S appears to have somehow evaded indoctrination, but handled Subject 4S easily enough. We are unsure if the indoctrination program has been defeated entirely or simply failed to trigger, at this time."

"Any indication she remembers anything?"

"Nothing of consequence. The Primary verified it."

"Are there any barriers to her elimination?"

"The Primary has grown fond of her."

"The Primary can be replaced."

"The Secondary requires further grooming to serve our purposes, and is one of the prime candidates for continuing with the Project. We can still obtain valuable data from 9S, and if worst comes to worse we can eliminate 9S and the Primary at a later time. With the Erasure system the situation is not time critical."

"Step up grooming of the Secondary. The Primary's performance has been less then satisfactory for sometime."

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Neun noticed a glint of red from the Student President's wrist in a familiar shape. It seemed like there was something she should remember about that. Especially given, except for the color, she had an identical one on her own wrist but such details evaded her. The Student President also wasn't really giving her an opportunity to do anything more then listen. Incidentally there was something about the dark haired girl that made the hairs on the back of her neck stand on end.

"Regardless, the paperwork will not be completed today." The Student President seemed to finish the conversation with an almost palpable slash of something sharp.

"Surely she can at least stay on campus though, Shizuku-san." Not that Kaede was impressed with that.

The Student President made a dismissive gesture. "Send her to the Library."

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As was appropriate to such a large institution the library was considerable, being a two story affair with tightly packed shelving units that were at least twice as tall as even her currently monstrous height. If she ever was qualified to comment on the selection she wasn't now. Still she was pretty sure it was respectable. It did however leave a question of what to read given she probably wouldn't see Kaede-chan for several hours.

Neun noticed a girl with glasses, green eyes, and a headband who seemed to keep looking at her from across the library. She looked like someone whose biggest problem would be choosing the right boyfriend, unlike her who was liable to intimidate them based on physical size alone. Cute would simply be beyond her when she was towering over everyone by at least a full handspan. This girl however managed to pull it off, even with glasses.

Neun mentally sighed to herself. Dwelling on what she couldn't change was a waste of time. It was far better to focus on changing what she could. Looking down she once again noted that she was wearing long black socks and miniskirt. Everyone she'd seen so far wore these really short skirt with the only variation with that had been what kind of legging, pantyhose, or socks they wore with it. Especially with the way she was now it was starting to make her paranoid about people looking up her skirt. The strange thing was that although so far she'd managed to safely stay in the girls' side for some reason she couldn't help but feel uncomfortable about it, getting the sense people were looking up her skirt. It was really weirding her out.

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Akane discreetly watched the odd girl from the morning wander in with a stunned look as she stared at the collection. She wasn't sure what the other girl found so interesting about it. The only reason she was here was because it was the only place in the school that girls could legitimately mingle with the boys. She was far too shy to make a confession, and with such limited interaction between the two sides how was one supposed to know who to make a confession to?

No, far better to wait where Mr. Right could find her and sweep her off her feet to... [content removed]

Akane wiped the line of drool from her face, quickly looking around to see if anyone had caught her daydreaming. The only other person in the library however was the girl from this morning, who had went utterly psycho on her. She was hot though, with a generous bustline, nice ass, and legs that went on forever... [content removed]

Akane was pulled out of her daydream when she felt something being gently pressed against her forehead. Something warm and soft. She blinked, and took off her glasses in order to see the blur right in front of her face, only to be confronted with the girl from this morning, causing her to eep in response.

Wait. There was cleavage to be had at this range. Only, as her eyes confirmed for her, the standard issue uniform utterly failed to show off the awesome cleavage this girl had to possess. It was criminal. A affront against humanity, that any view of those luscious breasts was safely tucked away. Damn them. Damn them all to hell!

"You don't feel like you're running a fever." The girl said in a concerned voice as she pulled away. "Are you feeling alright?"

Of course not. She was on the other side of the desk and still had clothes on. Plus from this angle she couldn't even take advantage of the consolation prize of checking out her legs or butt. It was an injustice. Absolutely criminal! "I'm not sure." She said meekly.

"Do you want me to take you to the Infirmary so you can lie down?" The girl from this morning asked in a concerned voice.

Akane started humoring fantasies of what they could do together in the Infirmary. [content removed]

Akane felt herself gently being placed in a bed, and looked over to find the girl from this morning finish tucking in the covers except for one arm while looking at her with a loving concerned look that made Akane just want to melt. The girl gently took her hand, and Akane found herself drowning in those blue eyes.

"Are you feeling better?" The question jarred her out of her reverie.

"I'll feel even better if you come in with me." Akane said, to Black Seppuku Rabbit, several hours later. Currently she meekly said, "I think so."

"I'm Neun. What's your name?" She asked pleasantly.

Having researched the German language following her becoming a Kampfer Akane recognized Neun a 9, and in that context that Viere was a permutation of Vier, albeit pronounced totally different. It all seemed rather bizarre. Why would she refer to herself, and her, by numeric values? Akane realized she was drifting off again.

"Ak-a-ne Mi-shi-ma. [aka Akane Mishima]" She said meekly in a voice she wasn't even sure the other girl could hear.

"Nice to meet you, Mishima-san." The other girl said cheerfully.

Dammit. Why did she have to start out on a last name suffix basis? Now she'd have to work through the entire process to be on a first name, no suffix basis if she wanted to be on the way to getting intimate. Not that she was into yuri. No, no it was just that, despite there being a boys' school literally on the other side of the fence, she had trouble finding boyfriend material. So to deal with her frustration she, discretely, checked out the girls too. Which was why she was going to need to retrieve one of her spare pairs of underwear from her PE locker, again.

"I think you'll be okay now Mishima-san, so I'll head back to the library." Neun said before gently kissing her on the forehead. Akane felt her face flush as she watched Neun walk out of the Infirmary giving a nice view up her skirt from this angle. It then occurred to her that she actually remember this girl was a boy when she'd first seen her... It looked like she had just found Mr. Right afterall.

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Neun stared at the fancy toilet, at the place where the nonexistent toilet paper should have been, and then back at the fancy toilet. At least she hadn't come here in such desperation she didn't have some time to try to figure out how this thing was supposed to work. Neun pressed one of the buttons and with a whirl a mechanical arm extended and fired off a jet of water. The implications were rather creepy.

"Never used one before?" A vaguely familiar female voice asked from behind her.

"No. I'm not sure what half of this is even for." Neun said honestly, turning to find the Student President standing there with a smile that creeped her out. It also begged the question what she was doing there. Did she patrol the bathrooms or something?

The Student President boldy entered the stall with her, showing no respect for personal space, and placed a hand on the controls. "These cause a mechanical arm to extend and squirt water into the appropriate orifice after you're done. This one is for the anus, after you go poop. This one is for your vagina, in case you want to clean up some of the blood, and this one is for the urethra after you go pee."

Neun blanched in the manner and way that the Student President just listed that off. It was like she was utterly immune to any effect from talking about embarrassing things. Then she seemed to be implying all sorts of dirty things with her whole manner of speech. Neun found herself being backed against the stall wall as the Student President seemed to inch closer with a serious look.

"I've heard that they can also make for a nice experience. Would you like me to operate it for you?"

Neun's eyes went big, and she began inching towards the exit of the stall. A distance that suddenly seemed rather far away. "No, that's alright." She made a dash for the door. She'd just find an unoccupied stall on a different level, preferably one far away from creepy girls with long dark hair.

Behind her Shizuku smiled, laughing internally. Oh this would be an entertaining one to tease.

Author's Notes:

Everyone has insecurities, particularly in the teenage years. I've simply made a point of having Neun suffer from this as should be appropriate under the circumstances. In case you can't read between the lines that means she tends to see herself as less attractive and otherwise then she is.

As currently setup Akane POV is meant to emphasize that repressed bundle of hormones aspect to the character. My personal view as will be executed with this particular series is that Kampfer Akane differs in personality in the same way Alcohol can render such changes, by lowering inhibitions. Yes, I'm the one intentionally putting [content removed] in.

This concept is based off the intro of the Anime series, where the initial reaction is more consistent with the kind of commentary you'd expect from a female then a male a respectable amount in. Something that ironically would explain many of the quirks in Natsuru's behavior. However I cannot in good faith declare this character was ever the canon Natsuru, and hence one of the reasons why she is Neun instead of Natsuru. Figuring out Neu-n was based on a combination of the canon character and how I would expect such a project to be run, hence the emphasis on efficiency leading to this mentality where common luxuries are seen as major extravagance.


	2. Chapter 2

Neun, The Resurrected Girl chapter 2

Disclaimer: Properties referenced include the Kampfer anime and manga.

Author's note: I will note when they shift forms, so if I haven't indicated a change they're still in that form. If this is too confusing I can add extra identifiers for that purpose, but that's needlessly clumsy.

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It was no secret to her that Kaede preferred girls, and some interesting facts had come to her attention. She had made a point to keep track of tardy students as it had helped to her to identify Kampfers in the past. Today among the absent was one Natsuru Senou, who just happened to fit roughly the same profile as this Neun girl Kaede had brought in. Not to mention the Administration seemed to be drawing from his records to setup Neun as a student. Granted she had never seen any indication of the existence of such a thing as a male Kampfer before, but among what she had pumped out of her Messenger was the fact all Kampfers were female. It would be a rather interesting turn of events if that could be interpreted as males thus would be turned into girls.

If that was the case it would make the proceedings all the more entertaining. From what she could gauge the girl was not into yuri at the moment. If left to her own devices she expected Kaede had gentle methods to seduce her. She however intended to insure that did not happen. Hence she was going to insure Neun was exposed to radical yuri at every theoretical opportunity by making a few arrangements, with break away linkages preserving total deniability, of course. That would insure by the time Kaede got around to making serious romantic advances Neun would be so traumatized as to automatically have an extremely negative reaction.

She had suspected for some time now that Kaede was behind things, although she couldn't prove anything. Not that, that would stop her for arranging vengeance such as she could safely sow and reap. There was also the small problem that Midori was in a position to report on her activities in addition to her Messenger, who had promised dire consequences when she had discreetly brought up the issue of taking out someone on one's own team. If this Neun hadn't been so close to Kaede already she'd would have eliminated her in order to prevent another person being solidly in Kaede's camp. As is she was leery of taking such an action.

There was still however the small matter of the problem of the Rule of Two. As long as she had been a Kampfer there had only ever been two Reds and two Blues, with quick replacement when one of the members died. That meant the only truly potentially free slot currently was that occupied by Akane Mishima. While reckless, foolish, and otherwise she had hoped Mishima's violent streak would have ultimately seen her gang up on Midori with the other Blue she had known would appear. She could have conveniently found herself indisposed, and even if they didn't outright kill Midori she could have arranged something.

As the board currently stood however Mishima was ultimately a liability as she blocked something that could change the board to her benefit. As such she would have to kill the girl, while continuing her efforts to disrupt Neun's relationship with Kaede. Hopefully she could arrange the new Blue that took Akane's place to assist with changing the situation in her favor, knowingly or unknowingly. It mattered little as pawns were to be played to one's advantage, not to play themselves.

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Neun had settled into the magazine and periodical section for the time being. Although she was just about to give up in frustration. Despite her attempts to find something that would stimulate a memory there hadn't been anything. Looking at the date quickly revealed she didn't remember any dates before today. Looking at previous events and magazines also failed to elicit any recognition. It was like she was in an entirely alien world except for her ability to speak the language. She started feeling the void opening open.

"Good Transnoon, Neun-chan." Neun felt something resting on her almost as if at a distance that seemed to close. As she sprung back to normal she realized she'd almost fell off the deep end again, and it was almost like she could feel something else in her head hissing in frustration.

She felt Kaede-chan sigh and was embarrassed for causing such a reaction. "Shizuku-san insists we can't be in the same class."

Neun wasn't sure what to say to that, if anything. This whole situation was just confusing, creepy, and weird. The closest thing she had to something to hold on to was this girl, however. This magician who seemed to have near bottomless bag of tricks to comfort her.

"Trasnsnoon?" She decided to ask eventually trying to redirect things in a more positive direction.

Kaede giggled. "One of the more technically minded boys came up with it, because he felt there should be a distinct greeting for around noon."

Neun blinked for a few seconds as it occurred to her what one normally did around such a time. "It's lunchtime?" She asked in an almost dazed fashion. Had it really been that long already?

Kaede giggled in a cheerful, almost musical fashion. "Yes. It's time to have some lunch."

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Like just about everything else in this place the cafeteria was of a nature Neun found to be unbelievably extravagant. Instead of long tables meant to cram as many people as possible into a given floor space, there were widely spaced little round tables in a manner reminiscent of a fancy restaurant. It simply made no sense to her. She was broken out of her reverie by a flash.

Blinking away the spots Neun saw a shorter then average girl with long hair standing in front of her with a camera. Kaede was breaking a pose of some sort when she glanced her way. Maybe Kaede had arranged for someone to take a picture?

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Just like her sources had indicated this new girl was tall, beautiful, and had a cool air about her. With the proper marketing she could make a good amount of money selling papers about her. Given her sources indicated a good amount of interest from the female population known to have those kind of tendencies casting her as being into yuri would be best.

The real question was how to handle the Kaede element of the whole thing. On one hand there would be those who would be all over gossip surrounding on of the Beauties pairing off with someone sizing up to be a new candidate to those ranks. On the other it would put a crimp on those interested due to the potential to go out with this new girl. Thus the real question was how to spin things to handle both simultaneously.

Yes she would emphasize they were friends, the yuri aspect, and that the new girl was not committed. Thus she could then juggle all three as Kaede and her weren't exactly falling over each other, but the implications could be played off of. Yes, that would be the nature of her story.

"Hi I'm Masumi. Would you like to do an interview?" It was always best to maintain the illusion she and her compatriots were not just making up their material out of whole cloth by going through the motions.

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"I'd rather not." Neun said in response to the girl's inquiry. There was something about this girl that was sending off all kinds of warning signals to her.

"It'll only take a few minutes. I'll even pay for lunch." The girl insisted.

"I don't think Neun-chan wants to do an interview. Maybe another time?" Kaede politely responded.

Masumi looked back and forth between them for a few seconds before wandering off with an air that promised she would be back. Neun had a suspicion that would occur in the library where the girl likely knew she was holed up for the rest of the day. She mentally sighed. Kaede noticed and smiled reassuringly.

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Neun was in denial this was cafeteria food. It was far too fancy and restaurant like. That didn't manage to keep her attention as she and Kaede-chan talked about various things. No, recognition of the fact she really didn't have a place to stay or anything other then the clothes on her back and the contents of a wallet that didn't belong to her kept butting in. In theory she could always return to that house, but she didn't trust it. The only solution to all this she could come up with was through Kaede-chan. She'd probably need to get a part time job to contribute towards expenses, but at least she would have somewhere to stay. Something she doubted she could raise sufficient funds to do on her own.

There was however the small problem of broaching such a subject. She couldn't exactly just say, "Kaede-chan, I need a place to stay." Undoubtedly there'd be all sort of questions and required justifications for such a thing. While Kaede-chan was nice, she wasn't exactly in a position to do such a thing of her own initiative and her parents at the very least would demand a rationale for such a thing.

"Kaede, I..." She broke into the conversation and found herself lacking anything to say. The situation was just too embarrassing as it tied in with all the madness of the situation right now.

Kaede smiled at her warmly in response, waiting patiently.

"Good transnoon, Kaede-chan." And the creepy Student President chose that exact moment to walk in and sit down as if she'd just been waiting for the right opportunity to intrude. The discomfort being near to her inspired, combined with the inherent discomfort involved in asking such a question left her throat contracted and refusing to help her. Her head wallowed on the table miserably at the new turn of events.

[/\]

Neun was just finishing putting the book she had been looking at away, when she felt someone gently hug her from behind. Based on the breasts pushing into her back, scent of a unfamiliar perfume, and the uniform sleeves she knew it was a female student but not much else. Looking over her shoulder didn't help much. It kind of weirded her out that whoever was doing this wasn't saying anything, or doing much of anything beyond gently holding her from behind. Yet at the same time it wasn't exactly something you made a big deal out of. Neun decided to just relax for the moment, the feeling wasn't unpleasant and the scent actually smelled rather nice.

Neun heard a soft giggling behind her and then felt the girl release her. They met halfway as Neun turned and she moved to meet the turn. It was a girl with overgrown bangs she had shift to one side instead of trimming away, making it so only one green eye was revealed. Neun caught sight of the fact the hair in the back was pulled into a tail in the moments before they were facing each other properly. From what she could estimate that meant roughly half was shifted forward and half back. From what she could guess the other girl was in the process of growing her hair out and just dealing with the difficulties of the intermediate steps in this way. The hair itself was a nice chestnut brown, that the other girl had clearly put the effort in to maintaining.

The other girl reached out a hand and rested it against Neun's cheek. "You're just like Shizuku-san described you."

What was that supposed to mean?

The girl giggled lightly and withdrew her hand. "I'm the Student Council Vice President, Midori Kuzuhara. You should prepare yourself for a lot of attention tomorrow."

"Uh why?"

The girl giggled lightly again. "We have a lot of students who are banned by their families from associating with the boys due differences in pedigree and that sort of thing. So a good portion of the student population ends up playing at having yuri relationships for various reasons. Some want to zing their parents. Some just want a particularly close friend and play with the inevitable talk. Some do it for kicks. In general we just have fun with it. Given you have a sort of T already..."

"What you're trying to say is make I a good stand in for a guy?" Neun deflated. Not only was she grotesquely tall, but people actually saw her a guy!

Midori regarded her seriously inching closer until she was in Neun's face, and then gave her a quick peck on the cheek. "No." Pulling back she shifted to a more businesslike tone. "You will need to watch out for the serious ones and the weird ones. They are a minority, but they are present. Otherwise you should be ready to go to start school tomorrow. Kaede-san will probably give you a tour around campus after school as you've been assigned to Class 2-4 instead of 2-1, but would you like to ask any questions?"

"I'm not going to be in the same class as Kaede-chan?" It was worth a try at a appeal. Midori's response however raised her visible eyebrow subtly at the form of address and continue on entirely businesslike.

"Class 2-1 is currently full, and given you've already been acquainted with Mishima-san, Shizuku-san thought you could join her class. The Class Representative and Vice Representative have agreed to have Mishima-san show you around tomorrow."

"Vice Representative?"

Midori blinked, and then smiled. "It's Seitetsu Academy policy to have two representatives from each class. Incidentally the Treasurer is also in Class 2-4."

"They aren't the serious or weird ones, are they?" The pause that followed was not comforting. It was really, really not comforting.

"Yes, but their harmless as long as you don't get drawn into one of their schemes." That really, really, really, really was not comforting.

"I'm doomed aren't I?"

[/\]

Neun trailed a half step behind Kaede-chan as she gave her a proper tour of the school. She still hadn't actually asked Kaede about taking her in, and the window to do so was closing. She didn't want to go back to that weird unoccupied house, but how was she supposed to ask about such a thing? She wished that she was more assertive, like Kaede-chan.

Even if she knew where she would spend the night was an open question it was still nice to spend time with Kaede. She always seemed cheerful and happy, and was just fun to hang out with. She was like a dream, a mirage of a oasis in the desert that was her existence that she couldn't quite bring herself to believe was real because it might fly away.

[/\]

Akane was pissed, and a pissed Akane was a dangerous redhead. She finally met and he, she whatever DID IT REALLY FING MATTER, was walking home with one of the Beauties! What did, ARRGH, Neun think, FINE SHE as she really had a fine ass, think she was doing when she could walk home with her? How the hell was she supposed to have a good encounter now! STUPID, STUPID, STUPID wait they were talking. Akane did her best impression of Sam Fisher as she slunk between pieces of cover.

"What you doing?" A child's voice asked innocently.

Akane looked over to see said child looking at her idly picking his nose. Couldn't he see she was doing her best to imitate Sam Fisher? The fact it was just a child cooled her rage for a moment, what would Natsumi Fujimoto do?

Mini Natsumi Fujimoto pointed and asked, "Do you know where the pretty lady lives, kid?"

Akane mentally nodded, and did what Natsumi Fujimoto would do leading to the child giving her directions to Kaede Sakura's house. Once again proving Natsumi Fujimoto was always right.

[/\]

Neun watched Kaede-chan walk down the path to her mansion with an air of defeat. Despite numerous opportunities she simply hadn't found a good way to broach the subject. She was debating simply running after her, when she felt a flare of something vaguely familiar. Looking towards its source she noticed Viere casually leaning against the wall at the edge of the compound, in the direction they had come from.

"Yo." The redhead said casually as if they hadn't fought this morning.

The utterly casual air of the other girl made her cautious, leading her to check the surroundings and otherwise look for some kind of trap. Finding nothing even after the fifth time her curiosity got the better of her and she walked towards the other girl, who just casually watched her approach with an utterly cool air. When she was about a foot to Viere's side, Neun stopped.

"Viere?" She asked, not really sure about anything at this point.

"If you're nine and I'm four then I guess we make lucky numbers together. Nice to meet you, partner." She said sticking out a hand.

This made Neun doubly suspicious. First there was this odd reference to numbers. Then she was referring to her as being her partner, despite having tried to murder her just this morning. Nevermind the incident that got her into this mess in the first place. Then there was the fact someone who'd run off after she scared them out of their wits was acting utterly casual around her, and now acting like she wanted to be friends out of the blue. There had to be some trick, and yet she couldn't find anything. So for lack of a better option she decided to play along, for now.

"Partners?" She asked cocking her head to the side in bewilderment.

A flash of annoyance passed over Viere's features. "Do you need a picture? You're wearing a blue bracelet. I'm wearing a blue bracelet. That means we're on the same team."

Neun blinked at her. What? Were they supposed to be a gang now? "Then why did you try to kill me this morning?"

Viere mumbled something really quickly while looking away. Neun just looked at her in bewilderment leading to the redhead rolling her eyes and saying. "I saw a guy hanging out with Kaede, and thought what a cute couple they made. Which pissed me off because I can't find a boyfriend."

Neun looked at the other girl for a second and then leaned on the wall next to Viere close enough she was leaning on her slightly. "Viere as always, you're insane."

"So, you actually remember anything?"

"Not really."

"Friends?"

"Why not?"

"Good. I wanted to order pizza today. We can share."

[/\]

Sakura stopped in the middle of solving the precalculus problem as it occurred to her that she'd left Neun outside her house, when the girl didn't really have a place to stay. Between the heady feeling of walking home with her and the anticipation of over an hours worth of homework after the teacher had decided to make an example of a girl who had been going on about her boyfriend before class, it had just completely slipped her mind. It had just been unnatural to think of the other girl as being, effectively, homeless.

Abandoning her desk she did not so much run as sprint for the door of the mansion and did not so much open the door as tear it open upon reaching its precipice, such was her haste. And yet, it was all for naught. The tall blue haired girl was not in front of the mansion or anywhere along the circuit Kaede Sakura ran before eventually having to slow down lest she simultaneously asphyxiate herself and make her heart explode. The worst part of it all was she lived in an area where she knew the neighbors were more interested in minding their own business then being neighborly, and hence asking about the other girl would not be productive.

It was a not so slightly drenched Sakura Kaede that dejectedly trudged back in the front door hours later. She had a mental image of the other girl hiding in an alley or under a bridge somewhere while it kept raining, even though she had checked every such spot she could think of. Yet she tried to hang onto it because the alternative was worse. For the alternative was that she would never see the other girl again. For she had failed her. Failed her utterly, due a second's inattention opening all the window They would require to snatch her back. It had happened before, and experience had taught her that if they were ever returned, they were never the same as when they'd left.

[/\]

Akane couldn't believe her luck. Neun was in her house, and incidentally flashing her as she wandered around tidying up this and that. There was however the not exactly small problem that Neun didn't have any spare clothes, hers wouldn't fit, and thus the best she could arrange was for Neun to take off her uniform blouse, leaving on the black zippered shirt that was beneath and concealed just about everything anyway. It was still a while before the pizza arrived, and the denial of actually seeing anything good was going to drive her nuts in short order.

So Akane went up to her room, to find that Black Seppuku Rabbit had apparently found a friend as another animated plushy was wandering around and chatting with it. A plushie that looked like a kind of pirate tiger due to the eyepatch. She vaguely recalled a name of Harikiri Tiger associated with the thing when she had looked through the Entrails Animals catalogue shortly after becoming a Kampfer. She had ragged on the rabbit for not being some of the cooler animals, which had incidentally included the tiger, those had been good times.

"You have someone over." The rabbit said in a way that was both a statement and a question. So Akane launched into a retelling of the days events, taking liberties here and there as a matter of course.

[/\]

"Come on." Neun wasn't sure how Viere had gotten her hands on alcohol, but it seemed entirely in character for her to have somehow rounded it up and decided to have pizza and a karaoke party. The vague instincts that seemed to be the ghosts of memories now lost also told her allowing Viere to get alcohol into her was something to be avoided.

"Lean on me when you're not strong!" Viere sang in a way that not exactly on tune version of Al Green's _Lean on Me_. Neun found herself getting dragged in despite herself.

"I'm going to need someone to lean on!" She joined in despite herself.

[/\]

Neun ended up borrowing an oversized T-shirt Viere had in her possession for some reason. Not that it helped that much, but she wasn't about to sleep in her uniform. There was however one not so slight problem when she looked in through the door. Not only was the tiger toy from earlier sitting there showing a surprising amount of dexterity and mobility for a stuffed toy, but it was joined by a black rabbit who also had a plushie knife driven into its plushie guts with a piece of plushie intestine hanging out. She quickly jumped back from the precipice of the door.

"What are you..." Neun grabbed Viere's mouth quickly looking around for a sign of anything else. But then what more did one need for a trap if what she suspected was true?

"That stuffed animal from this morning is in there with another one." Neun whispered forcefully.

Viere gave her a look that rather effectively conveyed "What's the big deal?"

"It was doing something to my head." Viere just looked at her.

"I humbly submit that you don't remember killing me." Viere mulled that one over for a few minutes before her eye's signaled acknowledgment.

"So you want to kill them?" Viere whispered gamely while materializing her pistol.

"Under the circumstances? No. Is there some kind of secure container you could put them in?"

[/\]

Harakiri Tiger looked at Black Sepukku Rabbit among the perforated stainless steel cage that surrounded them. "She's done this before?"

"Yes, when the timer finally counts down it fills with water and spins really, really fast." Black Sepukku Rabbit said with a laugh the average person would not attribute to a mentally stable individual. Indeed it was a laugh many would find downright creepy and disturbing in its connotations and implications.

[/\]

"We've located 9S at 4S' assigned residence. Do you want to send in a team?"

"That's the same 4S that's a raging psychotic?"

"Yes."

"And the same 4S you just reported she wants to make out with?"

"Yes."

"Let the Primary deal with it."

[/\]

Neun hadn't been sure that locking the things in the washing machine had been the wisest idea ever, although Viere continued to assure her that the plushies didn't have sufficient strength to open the door from the inside even when it wasn't locked. She wasn't entirely sure she wanted to know how Viere knew that, although knowing her she could imagine several likely scenarios which all revolved around intentionally turning the machine on with the thing in there. At this point she wasn't entirely sure what angle of that setup disturbed her most, the aspects revolving around she couldn't picture it not being a intentional act of revenge on Viere's part, the aspects revolving around the plushies, or that she was actually thinking of a washing machine in terms of a torture device.

Neun mentally sighed. The worst aspect of course was that she didn't have any spare clothes and was basically having to run around practically nude so that she would have something relatively clean to wear in the morning. She seriously needed to go clothing shopping. She should have went ahead and done it, but Viere's house had so much junk strewn about in a disorderly she hadn't been able to help herself. The entire concept of handling possessions in such a manner was utterly foreign to her, as she had always had to make due with limited, well taken care of, possessions.

At least they were both girls so it wasn't like she was going to be assaulted, but still wandering around in literally nothing but an oversized T-shirt did not sit well with her. Even if technically she was covered, she felt utterly exposed and embarrassed about her situation.

[/\]

Akane stared with interest as Neun seemed to keep squirming around in an embarrassed fashion. It looked like she would finally be getting some action, tonight. Her buzzed state led her to think it was a wonderful idea to go ahead and get started now. She made a grab for Neun's breasts, leading to her emitting a satisfying eep. Then there was an odd impact and everything faded to darkness.

[/\]

Kaede Sakura was listless as she woke up. She'd managed to force herself to mechanically complete her homework and prevent herself from shredding the cursed assignment, that she had a hard time denying had just cost her one of the lights of her existence. Normally she made a supreme effort to just act like a normal girl and try to ignore all the things associated with Kampfer that she had become aware of, or pieced together since she'd found that Lion. Supposing her own memories before that were even real, instead of some kind of imprint whose purpose was simply to execute the enigmatic purposes of those actually in charge of this whole mess.

With Neun gone and her fate all to likely to have fallen along lines she had seen time and again, she could not however manage to muster the usual cheery façade that helped to distract her from this whole mess. From experience she knew she'd eventually pull herself back together and continue on, but this time would haunt her more then some of them. Not only had the girl been special to her, but she'd lost her due to a simple moments inattention.

[/\]

Neun woke up to find herself looking at a vaguely familiar girl with brownish red hair. After a moment she recognized her as the girl from the library the day before. How and why the girl had ended up glomped onto her in the middle of the night was something she'd prefer not to contemplate. Given she had left Viere in the other room, it was always possible this was her better behaved sister who she had been too tired to notice last night.

She really didn't want to think about it right now. Her head felt like it was about ready to burst. It felt like something was clawing at her mind. Kaede! She needed Kaede's help right now. Quickly grabbing her uniform and not so much putting it on as jumping into it she rushed out the door.

[/\]

Kaede arrived at the bus stop early more due to a lack of appetite then motivation. This actually was the worst part of it. She had to continue the charade while being eminently aware of what was going on, but everyone else had forgotten. She had to live up to her idol status and pretend nothing was wrong, or else the others would make a big issue out of it. It was something that had encouraged her to take on habits that would not to the objective observer appear entirely sane. They gave her breathing room just acting in the normal mold would not allow.

[/\]

Author's Notes:

So after an excessive delay, we are back!

Kampfer is a series full of references. Early on in the Anime series there is even a comment of "You're not a Gundam." For those familiar with Gundam 0080 they would be familiar with a few things that make it rather unique. 0080 is an OVA series that revolves are an upgraded Gundam codenamed "Alex" and a Zeon special forces team whose mission is to destroy it. To make a long story short the climax of this involves a high mobility mobile suit, aka the Kampfer, basically singlehandedly wiping out the entire colony garrison using up all its ammo in the process before confronting the Gundam which proceeds to almost casually blow it away because it isn't armored like a Gundam. Further 0080 is noteworthy for having the "Alex" be operated by a woman.

Shizuku and Natsuru's characters have such serious parallels with another long running mecha series, using uncommon archetypes. This series is Guyver and the respective analogues are Agito Makashima and Sho Fukamachi. This archetype is what I've come to dub a duology of heroes. This involves one character who is your conventional anime hero, who really has no appreciation of the bigger picture and is rather aimless without an immediate threat to react to. The other is very much into figuring out and understanding the big picture, while having the will and followthrough to do what is necessary. The net result is a duology where depending upon the perspective you take one is in the wrong and the other is a hero. Sadly despite Guyver setting things up for this with Agito's backstory, the dichotomy has largely been ignored.

The nature of the approach we're taking combined with Shizuku being consistently less then accommodating towards Kaede in source material means we aren't necessarily going to have a lot of that here. We'll see what we can slot in though, maybe mad experiment with a transporter accident style fusion between Kampfer and Guyver.


	3. Chapter 3

Neun, the Ressurected Girl

Chapter 3

EALF Disclaimer:

This fic has been declared under protest by the Entrail Animals Liberation Front for cruel and unusual treatment of stuffed animals involving the user of a washer and dryer.

"We demand freedom from cruel and unusual treatment!"

"Yeah!"

"And more entrail animals/Natsuru slash."

...

"Wait, what are you doing?"

su -c 'mv entrails_protest /dev/null'

"NOOOO!"

password:

Disclaimer:

This fanfic is created under the principle of fair use and measures have been taken to not plagiarize existing IP. Properties referenced include Kampfer and Guyver.

[/\]

Neun could no longer see straight as she rushed towards the bus stop. Kaede had already left when she reached her house and she could only hope that she reached Kaede before the bus came. Her vision finally failed her and she ran into something. Everything was collapsing in on her, and it appeared her luck had finally caught up with her. She tried reaching out but could no longer had any tactile sense to know whether she was actually doing anything as the world seemed to fall out from under her.

[/\]

Kaede turned to the sound of running to see Neun. Her heart missed a beat. When the average lifespan of a Kampfer had been measured in days she'd seen this more then once. She simply lacked the knowledge or mindset to really make sense of what was actually happening, but whatever it did made it so they were never the same person afterwards. She'd struck upon the idea of using her mental magic to convince them they were already dead. It worked, after a fashion.

It was very difficult for her to use her magic in such a fashion and rapidly tired her. She would have preferred to not have to use it when she wasn't someplace it was safe for her to rest a while, but Neun was fading fast. She'd just have to hope for the best.

[/\]

Akane groggily woke up to find a supreme and utter lack of the girl she'd brought home last night. It occurred to her that maybe she'd dreamed the whole thing. Afterall who in their right mind would follow her home after she tried to kill them, and acted like a raving psychopath? And it wasn't like she hadn't had some very lucid dreams before where she [content removed] and then there were the ones where [content removed], and then there were the ones wher4e she went to school without any underwear and only realized after she sat down for class and everyone knew about it.

Or maybe she was remembering it actually happening and just that she'd been paranoid everyone knew about it until she'd been able to remedy the situation.

*Yawn* It was too much bother to dwell on. Walking out to the washing machine she proceeded to open the door.

"What's the big idea leaving us in here?" And tossed them in the dryer, walking away from a pair of screams as the dry cycle initiated. Whether they were of terror or excitement she didn't bother to contemplate.

[/\]

As Akane brushed her teeth it occurred to her that there had been a tiger in addition to her foul mouthed rabbit in dire need of drying out. Who was Neun's Messenger. Who didn't remember ever meeting outside of her dream where Neun had been over, and asked they be secured elsewhere. Hence why they had been in the washer, and the reason they hadn't been moved to the dryer yet was because she'd been too focused on trying to figure out some plausible way she could get into Neun's panties.

And that meant Neun had already left, and .

[/\]

Midori looked down at the collapsed forms of Neun and Kaede-sama lying on the naked pavement. She had felt something was wrong and rushed to Kaede-sama's side to find this puzzling sight. Not that the how or why was really important right now. Kaede-sama needed her help.

She paused to brush the back of her hand against Kaede-sama's cheek. She'd been her idol, someone who rose above the petty politics and seemed to genuinely care. She would not allow someone to sully her. (1)

"Hey Ugly!"

"If it isn't Miss Deadeye herself." She responded smoothly as the transformation occured, her slight subtle rebuke accomplishing vastly more then the red head's excessive and redundant noise.

"You bitch!" Again with the pointless noise.

She sent a bullet grazing off the red head's shoulder causing her to drop her gun as she reacted to the resultant pain. Before the red head seemed to really recognize what was going on she had kneed her in the solar plexus causing her to drop and the pointless noise to cease as the needs of respiration overwhelmed her need for endless chatter.

She internally smiled in a way that didn't quite come to her face. The girl had solved her problem.

[/\]

Akane stared balefully at the revolver the other girl cooly pointed in her direction. First she'd shot her, then she'd beat her up, and then she'd forced her to do manual labor! Stupid, stuck up bitch. Although seems as it had been Neun she was carrying she could [content removed].

And what was up with her having to be the one to bring out a futon, while all that stuck bitch did was tuck that other presumptuous bitch in? She didn't even get to be the one to tuck Neun in! How was she supposed to accidentally unzip her top now?

[/\]

Midori looked indifferently at the red head as they walked out of Kaede-sama's place of lodging. It had been a clean tidy environment that was like a breath of fresh air compared to her own quarters

"Hey Ugly." The red head declared in a perturbed voice that substituted in a meaning she seemed to lack the eloquency to express in a more intelligible fashion.

"I could kill you now." She paused and walked around the red head making a point to be utterly casual while unnerving her. "But then you know that I could kill you any time, don't you?"

It was like looking at a mouse staring at a giant snake, only she liked to play with her prey. Oh, that was interesting.

"But first I'd [content removed] and once you finally decided you couldn't live without me then I'd kill you. Like I did your prior partner." Midori smirked as she proceeded on to school.

[/\]

Neun awoke gasping with an impression she had been drowning. Where was she? What had happened? Her mind refused to make sense of her senses for several minutes until there was a pleasant sigh beside her. Looking down she saw Kaede snuggled up against her, sound asleep with a look of absolute contentment on her face. She couldn't help but stare at the vision before her as memories started to filter back.

She'd been... dying? The experience was so weird that in the face of her current tranquil environment she was ready to conclude it was nothing but a nightmare, a ghost of something that haunted the realms of her subconscious. Yet as more and more of the past day came back to her she could not deny it, and that her friend had saved her once again from something she really didn't understand but recognized on some level would be the end of her.

And Kaede had saved her.

She didn't know how she could repay that, but she felt she should at least try. Easing herself out of Kaede's grip she made her way towards the kitchen, where she could at least attempt to do one of the few things she knew how to do.

[/\]

It was a difficult dish to make correctly and one that took a considerable amount of time, but it seemed extremely appropriate for something she was making as a show of gratitude to be so. First she'd need to cut the potatoes into fine little cubes, then she'd need to spice them correctly and cook them as if she was making hash browns of them. Then she'd need to combine that with eggs and the appropriate cheese in the right ratios and mixture composition. (2) She'd developed it from a combination of relatively inexpensive ingredients she'd learned to make more appetizing through use of spices and better techniques, and that expensive and rare quantity that was cheese. Kaede's kitchen amazingly had everything she could possibly ask for along those lines, and quite a bit more. Caviar included.

Well there was nothing to it but to do it.

[/\]

Kaede was won over all over again, and felt fully justified in her decision, after taking the first bite. The way the flavors combined was simply divine, and yet Neun was showing that cute uncertain side of hers she had presented the dish to her. It would be a crime against humanity to let someone who could take simple ingredients and make something this good die, particularly when they were so willing to share the fruits of their gifts.

[/\]

Akane sat in the library mentally divided. On one hand there was Neun. On the other hand she was finding herself looking at revolver girl in an entirely different light. Even though she was supposed to be the enemy, she really seemed to know her stuff. She hadn't even thought of half of the more "compelling" stuff she'd brought up today.

No. She already had Neun... Well Sakura actually had Neun, but that was beside the point. She was going to be the winner in the end and no dangerously attractive attractive brunette with split hair was going to tempt her away from that.

[/\]

"Bathing together?" It wasn't like she hadn't relied upon public bath houses for as long as she could remember, but that was a little different from what Kaede seemed to be implying. Which instead of bathing in the same large room and sharing facilities seemed to involve a lot more skin contact, in a confined space. Maybe it was just all the talk about girls being after her that had her on edge. It wasn't like there was anything intrinsically wrong with them bathing together.

"Is there something wrong with bathing together?" Kaede asked completely oblivious to her thoughts or the concept of anything being wrong with it.

Neun felt embarrassed and silly for thinking such things about the girl who had only a few hours before saved her life. The previous days events must have really gotten to her to think such things of this pure and innocent girl. "No, nothing. It's just I've never done such a thing."

"You'll like it. You can relax and let someone else wash your hair and back." Kaede responded excitedly, causing Neun to smile in response.

Walking into the bathroom she noticed a significant presence of various bottles, but a supreme lack of soap as she knew it. To her eyes it looked like there was only the shampoo she occasionally allowed herself with the spare pocket money she was provided. (4) While Kaede was clearly had much more money then she'd ever dreamed of having access to it seemed rather weird she'd only have hair products.

"Where's the soap?" She found herself saying out load.

Kaede reached over and grabbed one of the bright colored shampoo bottles, which she now saw had the words "Body Wash" on it. "Here." It wasn't that she hadn't seen such things in the store before, but her assigned budget didn't allow for such things, which led to her wondering about assigned by whom until Kaede tugging on her clothes pulled her out of her reverie.

[/\]

Midori didn't even allow herself to appear perturbed as the meek girl with glasses asked to speak with her somewhere private. To do so would be to betray her supreme level of self control. As a important member of the Student console it was her job to listen to the other students issues and concerns. Even if they did make a point to go outside the proper chain of command and bypass their class representatives to see her directly.

After the meek girl with glasses seemed to be satisfied they were somewhere she felt comfortable to convey her concern she turned towards her looking ridiculously shy. Clearly the girl was some kind of wallflower, and there was actually a good chance that the issue was actually legitimate although of the nature that would cause major disruptions. Those were always so obnoxious.

"Midori-sama..." The girl stuttered out apparently so embarrassed by whatever the issue was combined with her apparent wallflower nature that she was having trouble vocalizing the issue. On one hand it was nice to not be addressed by some butchery of her title, on the other she had other things to do. Particularly as the chaos around setting up new reps and straightening out a racket would consume considerable time and effort to resolve.

She however smiled pleasantly and nodded for the girl to go on, being beyond allowing such petty stressors undermine her professionalism.

"Midori-sama, please take me as your disciple in the ways of perversion."

Say wha? The stream of words came out of the meek girl so fast they may as well have come from a machinegun and were followed by the girl prostrating herself before her. After thinking about it for five minutes it really didn't make any more sense then it had when the girl had said it. Maybe Shizuku was spreading rumors again. She liked to do that.

"Just helping to get you a date" her big toe. Not that she admitted having anything to do with it unless it was so blatantly obvious you'd need the be the Iraqi Propaganda Minister to deny it.(3) "Behind that stoic demeanor I know you're just a raging sex kitten waiting to get out" however took the cake for the most ridiculous and insane thing she'd said. One of these days she was going to teach that bitch a lesson, and then she'd have the last laugh.

[/\]

Neun let out little sighs of pleasure as Kaede found her knots of tension and began working them out. She'd never experienced anything quite like it, but it felt nice and she felt increasingly relaxed as the world seemed to simply slip away leaving behind a warm glow. She still wasn't quite sure why Kaede had felt it necessary to drag out a genuine massage table or why she had been so insistent on giving her a massage. At this point she really didn't care. She'd never been pampered like this and if Kaede was going to insist she was going to enjoy it.

[/\]

Akane transformed as soon as no one was in a position to see her do so. How dare that bitch turn her down after she'd said all those things that had turned her on. That was such a turn off, after she had spent all that effort to work herself up to asking her just so it would turn out like this.

A nearby bush felt her wrath as it was turned to shavings. For it to have turned out like this, just when it looked like her fortunes had really turned around. It just wasn't fair that it turned out like this. To be turned down just as she...

Someone started yelling, and she decided it was best to turn around and make her way to somewhere less conspicuous. Like the bathroom, in that stall they hadn't gotten around to fixing yet.

[/\]

"What's she playing at?"

"It's not like it was unforeseen. Even in the worst case scenario the situation remains well within our ability to control."

"She's defying us."

"You yourself requested her liquidation in favor of moving up the Secondary, and the only asset currently in play we cannot afford to simply liquidate is the very same one the Primary is protecting. Even in the case she did somehow manage to disrupt the overlay process, that is of little consequence as collecting the data we need is if anything impaired by its use."

"And what if she remembers?"

"You're overthinking things. That would require the soul to retain the mind enough to to carry with it its memories after it has left its mortal shell."

[/\]

Akane peeked out of the stall. That had been close.

"You really should use one of the stalls that's open."

Who said that? Looking towards the source of the voice Akane couldn't help but exclaim, "Student President?"

"You say that like I don't have a right to be here." THE Student President said casually while drying her hands. It occurred to Akane that she hadn't heard the water running. Looking closer she noticed a glint of steel for a brief moment. THE Student President's long sleeves covered where the contract bracelet would be, if it was there.

From what the previous Blue had told her there were always two, and Midori had not been the elder Red she had feared, but a new Red she hadn't anticipated. Which meant THE Student President was...

"How's the report from the Library Committee coming?"

Thinking fast Akane tried the only angle she could think of, "There have been a lot of new requirements and we're still sorting out the best way to meet them." Namely neglecting to mention the only reason she hadn't finished and filed the report already was simply because they'd been playing Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 multiplayer on the school computer system... and getting slaughtered repeatedly by CrazyKat. No way was she going to imply she wasn't still necessary and valuable to the continued operation of the student government. Particularly when the prior Blue had told her the Reds were supposed to be faster.

"I see." THE Student President said disinterestedly, seeming to be contemplating her hands or more likely the blade she had hidden there.

Seeing her chances of talking her way out evaporating, Akane decided discreetly moving toward the door wasn't adequate any more and made a break for it. Running directly into someone as she came out of the door, losing her glasses in the process.

"Are you okay?" The fact the voice was male, quelled the thought she should just go ahead and transform so that she'd at least go down fighting. Although it brought up questions of what he was doing here, although she had more immediate concerns.

Feeling around the incoherent blur that was her world she ended up mumbling "Where are my glasses?" to herself as they continued to make themselves scarce.

"Here." The male voice said and the world snapped back into comprehensible focus as her glasses were once more returned to her. In the process she realized she'd just run over the student president, of the boy's side.

"Uhhh... Thank you." She stuttered before making good on her escape through empty, abandoned halls.

[/\]

Agito watched the burnette rush off, and wasn't surprised to find his female counterpart coming out of the restroom. While there was never anything he could prove he'd seen this more then once, and they had a habit of being among those girls that mysteriously disappeared with neither staff nor students acknowledging they'd ever existed. The computers on the other hand didn't forget as easily as people thought they did and weren't as secure as the inept tech staff might think.

"Up to your old games, Shizuku?"

"Was there something you wanted?" She asked, pretending she hadn't heard his question.

"The budget report from the boys side is ready for your perusal." He said offering said document.

[/\]

Neun snuggled up to Kaede being careful not to crush her into her breasts like she had so many times before. It had been a truly wonderful day. She'd never felt like this, or at least she had the sense she hadn't given her memories didn't go far back nearly as much as her intuition.

[/\]

Kaede snuggled into Neun's ample bosom. She'd taken measures to insure the inevitable rebound didn't occur tonight, but occur it would. She wasn't sure what would become of Natsuru, but for now Neun was hers in every way that really mattered. Yet she wasn't really satisfied as she felt something was missing even as the warm well endowed girl gently snuggled against her.

It didn't feel empty in the sense manipulating someone with her mental magic to like her felt. It felt more like she could quite reach. That their connection was... Yes, that was fair. It wasn't like they'd really gotten to know each other, and as much as she might wish it otherwise she fundamentally knew this would be transitory.

[/\]

[The Entrails Animals occupying themselves in the dryer prior to Akane coming to take them out.]

Harikiri Tiger stood up on its tiny fuzz legs for it's turn. "Oh they're too scary" It said in its best mocking imitation of it's charge's voice. Walking over in a awkward stride it repositioned itself, and in its best imitation of Seppuku Rabbit's charge Why don't we throw them in the oven..."

"Ahhh..." Black Seppuku Rabbit interrupted point a stubby paw behind Harikiri Tiger.

Harikiri Tiger glanced over its shoulder to see a very tired and annoyed looking girl in glasses that looked extremely perturbed. It let off one of its trademark evil chuckles.

[/\]

Akane wasn't entirely sure what to think as she got ready for bed. The day had been eventful, there was certainly no denying that. But it hadn't been eventful in any way she preferred. The Student President appeared to be the missing elder Red. She knew she didn't have any chance alone. Maybe if Neun helped her she'd be able to manage, but not alone.

Throwing herself on the bed she started to turn in, and then the thought The Student President probably knew where she lived entered her mind and sleep was not forthcoming.

[/\]

Midori looked around her austere quarters, thinking about the days events. Kaede-sama hadn't come to school, which meant whatever had happened with her and Neun had been serious enough to keep her away. She summoned one of her revolvers, and proceeded to carefully disassemble it lying all the little parts out in an orderly fashion. The situation was complicated, and she didn't have all the pieces, but she'd see it through.

Her hope remained that she could be friends with Kaede-sama's newest associate. She seemed genuinely nice, if lost, and she found herself growing fond of her. She didn't look forward to when they must inevitably fight, but believed it would be done with honor and respect for the other when the time inevitably came.

[/\]

Neun woke up with an aching head that felt like it was a giant balloon. A part of her mind wondered if there was some way to pop it and make her head go back to normal. Feeling bizarrely top heavy in a balloon head way that didn't make any kind of real physical sense she managed to not fall over somewhere as she made her way to the restroom to relieve herself.

[/\]

The situation had not improved by the time she found herself standing at the bus stop with Kaede. Indeed she felt increasingly... She yawned...

Wait, wha? Looking around Natsuru noticed Kaede standing next to him and almost jumped out of his skin. "Sakura-san?" He found himself stuttering out.

[/\]

Kaede's smile was thin but still managed to be pleasant as the inevitable kicked in. When things would flip flop again she couldn't predict, but it would be a while.

[/\]

"She has returned the test subject exactly as you desired, and contrary to your expectations."

"That changes nothing."

"She's a valuable asset, and has lasted much longer then any of her predecessors. Surely you recognize without cause there is no legitimate reason to liquidate her."

[/\]

Agito checked his ultraportable for the server changelogs and noted one Natsuru Senou had been added in addition to creating back records of attendance. What really stood out though was a quick check confirmed they'd done the same thing a fw days ago only to wipe it out. Whatever they were up to he might as well keep an eye on this ghost that had come back.

[/\]

1) As always perspectives are written normalized to a conception and implementation of what works with the characters behavior while creating a consistent dialogue. These are not intended to be the testimony of reliable witnesses.

2) I've not actually done a real in kitchen verification of the combination, although I've worked with the all the components, so I cannot verify with complete certainty this is actually a wonderful idea instead of what simply seems like one. It does represents a whole lot of work to do all that prep work with the potatoes and you'd need the right kind of cheese to really make it go off if my intuition on the matter is correct. That is far from certain as my customized peanut butter cookie recipe showed, although how that deviated actually resulted in something better then originally intended and exposed a source of relatively inexpensive highly quality caramel for baking purposes at least. Neun may or may not magically have that recipe in a later chapter, as I'm assured they are quite good.

3) For those younger folks who weren't aware of such things when that happened, let's just say he exemplified denying reality.

4) Yes, bar soap can more or less be used in place of shampoo. No, that doesn't mean shampoo and associated are redundant for those with the budget for it.

Author's Notes:

And that should complete our initial setup and introduction work.

The officially licensed release is out, and quite nice if I say so myself. Not big on some of their phrasing choices verse the fansub people though like "Bowels Familiar."

When setting up this fic I opted to emulate Anime's handling of Akane, which pretty much insured we had to have moment of Akane being an over the top ball of sexual frustration. I really can't say I'm happy with how that came out with Midori, but it fits the humor profile and my dissatisfaction can mostly be summed up as "she's not her manga self" and "I can't believe I'm doing this." At least it'll moderate out more in subsequent chapters.

I spliced the Agito character in because the existing character set didn't provide what I needed and he functions well for the desired task/role. Note that the character has been spliced in, not the associated suit. This version has been tweaked versus the canon implementation, but is close enough there's no real point denying he's not based off that character. Or if you prefer Agito here is inspired by Agito Makashima from Guyver, but not really based off him.


	4. Chapter 4

Neun, Chapter 4

Disclaimer:

This fanfic is not warranteed against character death. This fanfic is written so as to deviate from referenced materials and thus not plagiarize their works. Properties referenced include Kampfer and Guyver.

All characters are based off of the referenced fictional people. Any resemblence these characters or situations may have to real people is entirely coincidental, in addition to being highly unlikely.

[/\]

Akane paused for a second as she walked towards her locker. No, that didn't make any sense. It had to be her imagination, or perhaps something she had eaten that disagreed with her and was giving her such an impression. Surely the Reds would not attack her here in the middle of... It felt like someone had slapped her under her breast.

"Too slow." Came the familiar voice of The Student President.

She whirled around, but the black haired idol of their school was not visible amongst the crowd. She was distracted by a kind of sticky warm feeling on her back and chest. Unconsciously transforming in annoyance she felt a spike of pain coming from right below her left breast. Reaching towards the offending area her hand came back covered in what took her a moment to recognize as blood.

It was not the usual red hue of the cells in the interstitial tissues and capillaries. Nor was it the dark maroon of the veins. No it was a nice pinkish color it took her several minutes to try to make sense of, before it occurred to her, in part inspired by the rhythmic oozing, that it originated from her heart. She vaguely recalled that the left ventricle, was the return side and so housed much thicker and strong muscle tissue then it's compartiot on the right which pumped the blood into the lungs.

Regardless of what her books had told her and how her other side might rage, the fact was she was dying. The part of her that had awakened when she had become a Kampfer, and she hadn't cared much for, pointed out she had a choice. She could either curl up in a corner or do something about this whole situation.

Wreaking her just revenge being denied to her that left only one alternative. She wasn't quite sure Neun was a guy today, but she'd looked up his assigned class before and knew how to get there. Should would have to settle for vengeance and dying in her beloved's arms.

[/\]

Akane continued to walk towards the boys side where she knew Neun currently was. Why did it have to feel so cold and alone as her limbs seemed to get heavier and her body less responsive while it felt like she was beginning to swim through a dreamworld?

Sure she'd never really seemed to connect to anyone until she'd become a Kampfer. Then there had been the older Blue who had shown her the ropes, before sacrificing herself for her sake.

"Akane, get down." She couldn't tell if the cry was real or part of the increasingly weak grasp on reality as she realized she was becoming more and delirious as the blood continued to seep out of her. It seemed vaguely familiar.

"You're too reckless. I've seen a dozen like you, all gone in a instant. You're like a pile of gunpowder." She glanced around for a source to the voice but only saw shocked students here and there looking like a pack of deer caught in headlights. No that was something else. Why was it getting so hard to think?

She stumbled and landed in someone's arms, looking up she found she had arrived.

[/\]

Natsuru followed the rest of the class out into the hall to see a fierce looking redhead hobbling along, with seemingly everyone simply looking on as she determinedly kept moving, using the wall as a means of support with one hand as she clutched the other to her breast. Her one white school blouse was now more red then white, while her complexion was quite the opposite.

Natsuru had a long history of opting out. This however was different. This was a human being in need, and while he wasn't certain quite what he should do in a situation like this he felt at the very least he should do something.

Just as he started to get close, she stumbled and he rushed forward to catch her. Instead of gratitude the eyes that looked up at him were filled with determination, and gave him the sense of having a very dangerous undertone. Not that he could quite piece together how that worked.

"What took you so long, asshole?" She said after a second in a way which seemed to have a odd divided quality that might have potentially been gratitude. It was at this point however he realized that the girl's other hand held a pistol, which was now being shoved rather aggressively into his face.

"I..." Natsuru trailed off dumbly, wondering if his brain was to be replaced by a bullet any minute now. And yet the bullet never came even though he found himself completely unable to come up with an adequate response.

"It was Shi-zu-ku, Nu-en." It took him several seconds to try to make sense of what she just said, while she started blinking blearily at him. Then the paramedics were there taking her away from him. As he started to protest their seperating them a hand fell on his shoulder.

[/\]

Natsuru was less then happy. The student president, of the boys side, had dragged him away to... "record a statement." This in turn involved paperwork that the "student president" was not happy with unless it was ridiculously detailed. All while he walked around the little conference room typing away on some sort of absurdly small computer that Natsuru was not only not familiar with, but hadn't been aware even existed.

It was all rather patently ridiculous. He hadn't seen anything related to the actual murder attempt, and yet they were going to grill him for details. And this was all being overseen by some whack job that he could only assume was texting his girlfriend given he seemed to be continuously typing away on his little computer.

"Well that's very interesting." The "student president" declared before going back to typing.

Natsuru waited a few minutes before his curiosity got the better of him. "What?"

"I can't remember the girl I was just writing about." He said seeming to become wrapped up in himself once more, grousing about this and that. "Perhaps some kind of suggestive mechanism? But then how are they creating the suggestive state and imprinting the conditioning?"

Natsuru had, had enough, "What are you talking about? You saw her too, You were right there when the paramedics took her away."

"Actually..." The device he was holding beeped. "Akane has just been deleted from the school database, and if things stay true to form once you leave this room I'm the only one who will acknowledge this happened or there ever was a girl called Akane. "

Natsuru mentally rolled his eyes, while refraining from following through with the actual physical gesture out of some sense of propriety. Ever since he'd followed the Student President into this room things had been nonsensical, and letting this guy get a raise out of him on something so patently nonsensical wasn't in the offing.

"Can I go now?" He did a heroic job of keeping the annoyance out of his voice.

"Yes, here's your pass."

[/\]

Akane blearily made out figures hovering over her. A small part of her mind noted the surgical masks and related attire, but she wasn't really coherent enough to make any sense of it all.

"She's coming around." Some voice declared she couldn't identify.

"Safeties have been engaged, so there's no reason to sedate her really. Make sure her quarters are comfortable."

"But sir it's Number 4."

"Yes, Number 4. You may remember that when Number 9 decided to try to escape Number 4 was on the ball. While she might have her quirks she's nothing if not reliable, and her utility is far from being exhausted."

[/\]

Natusuru returned to class. The teacher was oddly absent minded about the fact the Student President had pulled him away, which was odd because he was his usual highly observant self regarding the fact he had been absent. He'd also didn't say anything about the girl simply accepting the pass skeptically, before going back to the lesson. It was mildly tempting to humor the idea that nutbar of a student president was right there was some kind of grand conspiracy with magical powers able to make people forget something like that, but that was both ridiculous and a sure path to madness. If he started doing that next thing he knew he would be thinking the trees were conspiring to take over the world. Or maybe the squirrels, or the cicadas.

[/\]

After the close of the class in the period between the teacher moving to his next classroom, and the delay before the arrival of the next teacher, the usual chatter started up. Noteworthy in its absence though was any discussion of the girl or her murder. It was almost as if nothing had happened, at least as far as they were concerned. Which only served to make his own thoughts on the matter come more to the surface where they'd been bugging him constantly since the incident.

What had she meant by "Neun" and why had she warned him about what most people considered The Student President, Shizuku? Had she been the one who killed the her? Or was it another girl with that name that the redhead had meant. And why had she sought him out specifically? Or had he just read too much into things and he'd simply been conveniently close, or resembled someone else?

Had it been right to go with the student president and leave her to the paramedics or should he have insisted on riding to the hospital with her? It had felt like he had abandoned and somehow failed her when he'd given in to the student president's insistent requests to come with him. And for what? So he could listen to some inane conspiracy theories while she lay there dying? What kind of person was he?

"Hey there, Natsuru. What's up?" Higashida said in his usual carefree manner. An idle thought occurred to Natsuru that if anyone might have an idea who the girl was it was Higashida. Afterall he... made a big point of photographing any girl on campus who was or could be generally considered hot and selling them... Why did he hang out with this guy again?

"Do you know who that redhead was?"

"What redhead?" Higashida asked looking around excitedly as if he expected to spot some hot redhead lounging about.

Natsuru couldn't help but scrunch him face in annoyance. He started to say. "You know the girl who died in my arms before the start of the class period." but stopped himself. Now he was starting have his doubts that anyone else remembered. Instead he said. "She had shoulder length red hair."

Higashida seemed to consider that for a while. "You mean Konaka?"

The name didn't ring a bell, but then he didn't share Higashida's fascination with cataloging every girl on campus, despite the rather serious security measures in place.

Higashida dug out a picture of a girl that could have been her, but clearly wasn't. Natsuru couldn't help but make a mental note of her even as he recognized it wasn't the redhead. Not that he thought he'd have any chance with her.

It suddenly occurred to him that the student president had mentioned another name. "Do you know a Akane?"

Higashida thought about it for a moment, weighing the possibilities. "Well there's one in the swimming club, but she's kind of flat."

Natsuru wouldn't characterize the girl he'd caught earlier as kind of flat, but then he wasn't as obsessed with girl watching as Higashida was, and their standards as a result weren't necessarily in sync. For all he knew Higashida might consider girls kind of flat unless they were almost ridiculously well endowed.

[/\]

Classes finally ended before the start of lunch period. He was really beginning to feel the need to talk to someone about this, but the closest thing he could come up with to someone he wanted to talk to about it was Sakura who was securely on the girl's side and thus quite beyond his ability to see, let alone talk to unless he was lucky enough to meet up with her on the way home.

He wasn't interested in dealing with the student president, even if he had the creeping sense he was right, in defiance of all seemingly unassailable logic to the contrary. Higashida was really only interested in either trying to sell photos, and was disturbingly good at setting him up to do something stupid. And the sad thing was really that was it. No one else came to mind he even vaguely felt he could talk to about this.

Natsuru bit into the bread he'd bought for lunch with about the farthest thing from relish. While the food was actually rather good it simply wasn't the same when...

Natsuru felt a warm liquid trailing down his hand, and without thinking started to look around for something as he felt his arms begin to shake. He recognized a second later he had been looking for the girl and the liquid was just some sauce, just in time for the comments to start coming in about his freaking out.

[/\]

"What's going on here?" Said bursting into what passed for the, boy's side, student president's office.

"If I knew I'd tell you. Usually information control requires controlling the avenues of distribution so as to control the message going out to the people. You use propaganda, disinformation campaigns, and other various techniques to focus attention on the wrong areas or the areas you want in the way you want and you create consistent dialogues to do that. Cutting through these techniques requires being able to break the illusion by looking at it from angles that cause it to fall apart, just like optical illusions. You need to avoid getting sucked in by the fantastical elements they like to use and work with an understanding of how things work. Things like having the means, motive and opportunity or that people aren't puppets you can just manipulate like there on strings.

I still can't quite figure this out how this work though. It's like they've managed to cut through all that and they can just push a button and suddenly they can make everyone believe whatever they want. But if they can it doesn't explain why they're using it this way. Why go through all the effort with however they're doing this to cover up the murder of female students? Why murder them in the first place? Why not just use it directly to accomplish whatever it is they want if there's a real objective to all this." Agito trailed off for several minute before starting up again.

"When I started digging I found whatever they're doing to change people's memories seems to be mainly constrained to the school. There are people who remember outside, but they're people so disconnected it doesn't mean anything, and they just start into rationalizing of their own accord.

So my current presumption is there's basically some kind of magic artifact here that allows them do it, which they can't move."

"You say that like this isn't new."

"It's not." Agito set down hit little computer facing Natsuru. "When I checked the computers I found while they removed the records they neglected to clear out the log files of the modifications to the database or to destroy their old back ups and stuff that was in hard copy. I know I don't have all of it, but these are the ones I've been able to recover pictures of." Pressing a button started an application which began opening pictures and then tiling them to the background. It quickly became obvious there were a _lot_ of them. After the picture of a brown haired girl in glasses flashed up and tiled to the background, it started bringing pictures forward in order and the dismissing them back to the tiled background.

Natsuru realized the girl who'd died in his arms wasn't among them, at all. "Where is she?"

"Who?" Agito asked clearly puzzled at the question.

"The girl that died in my arms."

"She wasn't the brunette with glasses at the end?"

"No! She was like the opposite of that girl." Why would he even suggest that? Whoever the redhead had been she was someone who was aggressive and took charge, not some kind of meek bookworm.

Agito paused for a long time over that. "I have a theory." He eventually stated.

Natsuru made a rude noise, while he might as well be living in the Twilight Zone given current events, that did not mean he was suddenly humoring crackpots. And even if this guy was the only one who seemed to know anything about this, he was clearly as cracked as they come. First he was claiming all these girls had somehow been murdered with no one the wiser, and now he was getting ready to claim two people that were clearly polar opposites were the exact same person.

Given that was clearly going nowhere he decided to drop it in favor of a more pressing issue then one Agito was likely to be unable to provide anything useful about. "What do you mean nobody knows? How can no one have seen something and reported it?"

Agito paused with a secretive smirk. "In 1964 Kitty Genovese was brutally murdered and raped in New York City. It is said there were thirty eight witnesses who watched it happen and none called the police. The media and the experts as a result flocked to denounce the public at large."

"That really happened?" Natsuru deadpanned.

"Not quite. There weren't thirty-eight witnesses, there was only five or six and they confabulated more then they saw anything. Not that the media cared. It was a perfect opportunity for scandal and drama like creating the myth of spontaneously exploding cars because fuel leaks and fires simply lacked enough pizzazz."

Natsuru rolled his eyes. What did this have to do with anything? It was just more conspiracy theory nonsense.

"What it does demonstrate is that people are willing to engage in rather dramatic rationalizations with nothing more backing them up the what someone in a perceived position of power and authority said without even attempting to verify things themselves. A problem old enough that Bram Stoker had Van Helsing make a rather eloquent statement on it in his novel, Dracula.

As you saw the trappings are maintained for the outside world and rumor formation is suppressed by wiping those who'd be actual witnesses to the event. Ambulances of the same apparent type patrol the area on a more regular basis then the actual incidents, but still infrequently enough as not to seem out of place. So the bottom line is if you're not already looking into this or are able to remember, what's there to know?

It's not like you believe me, and I have the most substantial evidence available."

Natsuru had to grant him that much. Grudgingly, because reality seemed determined to twist his arm along those lines, but he had to grant him that much.

[/\]

Natsuru felt like kicking something as he made his way to the library. A girl was dead, and the very universe itself seemed to be conspiring to force him into a choice of believing the patently absurd or that it had never happened. But as absurd as the alternative was, it had happened. His memory could not be more clear, and it had unsettled him on a very fundamental level.

Seeing nothing better to do he figured he might as well at least try to find something in the library so he at the very least could feel he was doing something.

[/\]

She will come to change her opinion quite dramatically once she "realizes" Natsuru is Neun and the connotations of their relationship with Kaede.]

The blue bracelet he couldn't remember where he'd picked up flashed like it was some kind of miniature strobe light, and his arm started shaking involuntarily again. Looking up he saw a girl with hair obscuring her face that was regarding him curiously.

"It really affected you didn't it?" She said calmly sitting down across from him.

He regarded her for a moment to mentally exhausted by the universe being contrary to make heads or tails of what she was referring to. "What did?"

"Why the death of your partner. It's never easy for a new Kampfer to deal with that particularly if they have to watch the life slowing fading away like you did." She said regarding him in a consoling manner.

"Wait, you mean you actually remember?" Just when the world seemed to be ready to cave in on him it decided to throw him a bone.

She regarded him with no small parts compassion. "Yes. Don't worry it happened." Glancing away she added. "And not by my hand."

"I don't understand."

"I'm afraid there's not much to understand. We'll meet again Senou-san. I look forward to that day."

[/\]

Shizuku leaned back from her perch on the banister along the edges of the library's second floor. While it would not be accurate to say everything was proceeding according to plan, things were proceeding more than smoothly enough. The remaining Blue was bordering on turning into a nervous wreck and Midori instead of taking advantage was actually regarding the survivor with pity.

[/\]

Natsuru still felt off balance as he packed his bag. Even with the odd girl and the student president helping to confirm he wasn't simply losing his mind, what was happening was just so weird and disturbing.

Finally getting his stuff together he left the gate to find that Sakura just happened to be walking by, by some manner of divine providence. Of course, telling her was just a likely to result in alienating her as anything else.

"Hi there, Natsuru-san." She said in her usual cheerful manner.

"Hi Sakura." Natsuru responded back with a complete lack of energy while he found himself unconsciously trying to wipe away blood that was no longer there.

Sakura seemed to notice the gesture, leading to her having a concerned look while she seemed to be pondering something. Natsuru expected she was probably wondering if there something wrong with him.

"Don't worry. It's just…" He went cold inside as he dared even try to come up with some lame excuse. It felt like it would be a betrayal of her memory to do such a thing.

"Natsuru, if something's bothering you, you can talk to me about it." And then you'll throw me in a loony bin for my own good Natsuru mentally finished.

[/\]

Kaede couldn't help but feel somewhat annoyed as Natsuru walked away. He didn't trust her enough to talk to her about the truth, and so he kept on suffering. The Rules made it so she couldn't simply reveal what was going on to him, but if he actually honestly came to her that was a different story.

She hoped this didn't extend to the identity of his other self, particularly if he was interested in meeting her feelings. If he couldn't be honest about her with something like that, what could they build a relationship on. It might simply be better to play the villain at that point, for both their sakes.

At least then there would be closure.

[/\]

Natsuru felt a strange sense of dread of as he caught sight of his home. He was at a loss to explain the source or the nature of it beyond being strongly apprehensive. He spent an excessive amount of time checking various things, like he was some sort of paranoid freak, before finally deciding to simply ignore it.

What he needed was a nice hot bath, so he could relax for a while.

[/\]

Natsuru settled into the bath. What a day. But now he could finally have to chance to take a load off and relax. Just let everything go and...

Neun woke up to find herself in an unknown location, sitting in a bath with nothing on. Well she supposed it was only natural she had nothing on given she was in a bath afterall, but she recalled nothing of how she'd gotten there or had the slightest clue even where here was. So while under different circumstances she would have appreciated the chance to rest in the nice hot water, as it was quite pleasant, she couldn't get out of it fast enough.

The last thing she remembered was getting ready to go to school with Kaede… and she had the oddest sense that Viere was either dead or in serious trouble. Moving quickly she found something that was good enough to throw on before heading out the door, realizing she was leaving the house she'd first woken up in on her way out.

[/\]

She found Akane's apartment easily enough but there was a dead feeling to the place…

Remembering that Akane had thrown the two entrails animals into the dryer she made her way to the communal laundry room, and found they were still where they'd been left. With her instincts telling her that Viere was long gone, they were the last lead she had she weighed what they could offer against the threat they represented.

She almost didn't do it, but the need to know overcame her objections over the risks. Moving quickly she opened the door and quickly grabbed both by the head. While the tiger struggled in her grip, the rabbit simply hung limp like a stuffed animal was supposed to.

Putting the rabbit down she slowly let pressure off the tiger's head, allowing it to speak. She made sure to keep a good grip so that she could neutralize whatever it did quickly.

"She's dead." The tiger said in a quiet subdued fashion. Neun's eyes were drawn to the rabbit which continued to simply hang there like a limp stuffed toy, but had the sense the tiger meant both Viere and the doll.

"I'm sorry." She said picking up the stuffed animal in a more normal fashion, who seemed to be taking the loss harder then she was. She had the sense this had all happened before, although she couldn't seem to catch the memories as they ran through her mind.

[/\]

Kaede paused outside the apartment laundry room where she could hear Neun sobbing. Her heart tugged at her, but she knew doing so with the Messenger there would undermine everything she'd done so far.

Author's Notes:

This wasn't the most easy chapter to write and has been rewritten quite a few times now, even if you don't count the fact the original outline for this chapter was ultimately broken down to handle multiple chapters.

And honestly I'm going to leave it at that for now as I've rewritten the Author's Notes a dozen times while trying to say something more meaningful, and haven't come up being happy with it any of those times.


End file.
